


Our Dirty Laundry

by Theatrhythm



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: Also humor I guess, Angst, F/M, Haha. ha, Rejection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-20
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-01 18:09:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8633125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theatrhythm/pseuds/Theatrhythm
Summary: Apparently the only chore in Seven's life is dealing with her. It's time to teach him a thing or two about respect.





	

**Author's Note:**

> These are the kinds of things I screamed at my phone while playing through this Memelord's route.

Jeans on the floor.

The prospect is less arousing than she had hoped, all things considered; it's not like it was preceded by the spicy strip tease she imagined. No, Seven's jeans are just crumpled on the living room floor in a dark heap, dirty and unlaundered, with a nice big stain of questionable liquid. She _hopes_ it's Ph.D Pepper. The other option is a bit much for her sensibility.

"Jaehee wasn't lying about him being a slob," she mutters under her breath. She picks up the discarded pants by the waistband and hooks them over her laundry basket.

For the first 24 hours, Seven was immaculate. Maybe he put in the effort to avoid any unnecessary contact or confrontation altogether, which admittedly still stings, but at least things were _clean_. Dishes washed and dried on the rack. Toilet seat down. Clean clothing set out and folded, sometimes still warm, on her bed.

_(A small comfort was wrapping herself in a piping-hot blanket fresh out of the dryer and curling up on the couch, listening to the clack of his fingers furious against the keyboard. The only warmth in the apartment.)_

As the hours crept on, however, it became clear that her new roommate probably could have benefited from a college dormitory experience, if only to hammer in the basic necessities of co-inhabiting an apartment.

First it started with the discarded clothes - a jacket slung over the couch arm, a towel on the bathroom floor, sometimes damp, sometimes smelly, and almost _never_ clean. It's not like she minded tossing it in with her own load, but give a girl a heads up, you know? Who _likes_ to step in something wet that soaks right through their socks?

Next came the crumbs, bits of bread littering the kitchen counter, chip dust haphazardly wiped on his shirts to clean his fingers, which, of course, inevitably pooled on the hardwood floors, the golden specks plastered in a sticky swath. At least she now knows that Honey Buddha _is_ made with real honey, she thinks sourly, scrubbing the mess out with a soapy washcloth.

Then, more unforgivably, came the hair. She partially loathes to admit it, given she shouldn't be fawning over him when he's being such a classless act, but he has very, very nice hair. Thick and curled, bright and shiny, probably a dream to run her fingers through, and endless, endless, endless. She knows it is, because it's easy to spot strands of it _all over her fucking floor._ It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't also tangled up in her drain - did he not have to deal with the hot mess of uncloggings in his top secret lair, or did he assume he could just pour some Drain-O down the hatch like it's got the same chemical components as sulfuric acid?

So by the third day, she's grumpy. She doesn't fancy cleaning either - who does? - but it's just a necessity of adulthood. Like paying your bills, and scheduling dentist appointments, and stocking your pantry with toothpaste and toilet paper.

Well, maybe not for Seven. Because she's down to three sheets of ply, which was definitely not the case a few days ago.

So she does the only thing a _reasonable_ adult does.

She screams.

**_"SEVEN!"_ **

The holler echoes throughout the apartment, ricocheting off the walls; she hears the clatter of the keyboard cease and a sharp intake of breath cutting off his string of mutters, followed a frustrated exhale. His _(it's not his, why is he staking a claim to everything!)_ chair screeches noisely against the floor, followed by the light tread of socks on the hardwood.

"What is it, MC? I'm in the middle of something important, this better be..."

His voice trails off. He blinks.

She's standing in the doorway, the flush of the toilet droning noisily behind her, and her eyes are _hard_ and trained on his. One hand clenches in a tight fist around the cardboard roll, the other pointing accusingly at him with a single outstretched finger.

"I just had to fold those pieces of paper _five_ times to make a _decently_ absorbent square so I can _pee_ and I had to _strategically wipe_ so I didn't cover my own _hands_ in my own _piss_ and you. Are going. To stop. Working. To help. With. _Cleaning._ "

He frowns, eyes flickering to her fist and back to her face, uncertain. "Clean? I don't..."

" _ **CLEANING!**_ " she screeches, throwing her hands up dramatically, and he flinches, appearing sheepish for the briefest of moments, before retreating back into that frigid, stiff stance she's had to put up with for the last few days. _Ugh._ Just the sight gets her blood boiling all over again.

"MC, I don't know what this is about," Seven says flatly, "but I really have to keep an eye on those feeds while I work on finding these hackers. This is to keep you safe, so why exactly are you choosing now of all times to..." His voice wavers and fades again under her cold, steely gaze, and he shrinks back a little.

_(She would be impressed with herself for being intimidating for once in her routinely underestimated life if she wasn't so furious.)_

"I _choose_ now because _you've_ made it a habit to turn this apartment into Seven's Swamp with your _trash_ and _clothes_ and _trash_ and _pretty hair_ and _traaaash_ ," she hisses, eyes narrowed to slits. "And you've forbidden me to go around the fucking block to get a single box of tissues or dish soap or paper towels, so that's _your_ job now. Congratulations!" she inserts loudly, twirling her hand and curtsying exaggeratedly. "You get to learn how we non-Gods do it here on planet Earth!"

She straightens again, panting, her breathing ragged and uneven. He just looks at her in astonishment, eyes flickering around the apartment in confusion, slowly taking in the squalor of their living arrangement; the guilt creeps onto his face, though he almost immediately covers it back up with an impassive mask.

"Okay," he admits, rubbing the back of his neck. "Okay. I get it. Fine. What do you want me to do?"

* * *

 

"I'm supposed to _touch_ that?"

"You've never seen a hair monster before, have you?"

Seven shakes his head in disbelief. His own bright hair is pulled back tidily with a white cloth wrapped around his forehead and tied at his nape. A mask guards his face, and comically large pink rubber gloves cover him up to his elbows, squeaking with every movement. He's keeling over the bathtub on his knees now, with a bottle of solution in one hand and the other nervously hovering over the now-open drain, where an ambiguous swath is lodged firmly into the crevice.

"It's _sooo grooooss_ ," he whines.

" _Yeah_  it's gross. Have you seen how long my hair is? I have to go through this almost every week or my feet are two inches deep in water," she laughs.

"Girls are something else," he says, brows knitting together.

"Well, Jaehee probably has an easier time," she says pointedly. "Her hair is short and relatively thin, you know, so it's not so bad. Zen's," she hums, "is both thick and _very_ long, so he does this almost every week, just like me. We trade cleaning tips."

He makes a face. "You would, wouldn't you."

"Yours," she adds, "gets just as much in there as his. You could use the advice, honestly."

"Taming the Monster from the Black Lagoon is not in my repertoire." He cringes as he prods a wet clump of orange and brown wisps with the tip of one gloved finger. "Ugh. It's like Jumin threw up a week of furballs."

"You mean Elizabeth the 3rd."

"Nah." He purses his lips. "Jumin cleans her, sometimes. With his tongue. I've seen the security feeds."

"Thank you for that image. How have you not dealt with this before?" she asks, disbelief on her face. "Do you just wash yourself from the neck down?"

"Vanderwood helps me out most of the time," he admits.

"Oh." _Right_. The maid. "Well, you'll have to deal with it eventually, you know, when your hacker fortune runs dry."

"My fortune won't run dry, I've heavily invested in chips. It's a booming market."

"One day some special edition of nachos will give your inventory a run for its money," she comments, cracking a smile. "Get in there, soldier, and pull it out."

He lets out another whine, fingers pinching the top of the hair clump, and tugs; most of it pops out with the sound of a small uncorking, but several strands cling to the grate to leave a stretch of hair that flops onto the ceramic tile, and he gags openly.

"In it goes," she says, holding out a plastic garbage bag. He drops it in unceremoniously with a _plop_. "Now get that last bit - good - and pour that drain cleaner down so it can get out any accumulated gunk. We'll let it sit for an hour before we run the water through."

"Aye-aye," he murmurs, tipping the bottle; the blue liquid begins gushing out in an exaggerated _glug-glug-glug_.

She nods, humming in satisfaction. They made a significant enough mark to please them both - even after what, in retrospect, was an embarrassingly loud outburst on her part. Their clothes were tossing noisily through the dryer humming in the hall, the floors were vacuumed and wiped down to gleaming perfection, and the kitchen sink was scoured spotless. Seven, to his credit, seemed to have taken her words to heart. He voiced not a single complaint as she ordered him around, following each request down to the minute details. Her temper, in turn, simmered down to being lukewarm.

Now she was starting to feel _bad_ for being so biting. After all, Seven probably had no experience with housekeeping, not when he had hired help to keep things in order. It's a rich kid problem, she thinks tiredly, but she can't really hold it against him. Jumin probably wouldn't know the stick-end of a broom; at least Seven is willing to give wielding one a shot.

This is the most cooperative he's been his whole stay, anyway. It was nice, to finally get him to crack a smile, to share a laugh, after such an emotionally charged few days. She didn't expect it to last, but she could at least enjoy it while it did.

"Hey." Seven's voice cuts through her train of thought and she startles, blinking down at him.

He's gazing up at her with those bright golden eyes, piercing and serious. They flicker away briefly - is that embarrassment? - before meeting hers again.

"I'm... really sorry."

His voice is so earnest that her heart can't help but soften a little, even when on her guard. "For what? The not cleaning bit? It's fine. Just vacuum every now and then."

"Yes and no. I'm not a very considerate person when it comes to... Well, other people," he says wearily. "Not when it comes to domesticity, at least. I wasn't paying attention to how much of a slob I was being. That's not an excuse, I know, but I never have to _care_  since I'm the only one who  _deals_ with the consequences usually, so-"

"Seven," she interrupts. "It's fine, really. I get it."

" _No_ ," he shoots back, tugging down his mask, clearly frazzled and upset. "No, you _don't_ , I... I work really hard _specifically_ so I don't cause problems for others. I keep myself out of the fray, off the radar, to avoid making things difficult, but I just ruin it anyway-"

"Seven," she interrupts again, quietly, "are you really talking about cleaning?"

He pauses thoughtfully, pursing his lips. "I plead the fifth."

"What are you, on trial for being a jerk?"

"I don't jerk it _that_ much."

She shakes her head, chuckling. "Dumb. If we're gonna keep this truce, you better get back your joke game."

His smile fades, and he looks away uncomfortably. A sore subject, she realizes, and she feels a flare of annoyance. It was only uncomfortable because _he_ was making it uncomfortable, after all - he's the one who threw his entire sense of humor out the window.

He clears his throat. "I just want you to know that... I don't mean to be shitty, but it's for the best."

"It's for the best that you leave your pants draped over the armrest? Best for _who_?" she asks in disbelief.

"You know what I mean."

She sighs tiredly, pushes herself up from her knees to stand. Because she does, but she had hoped to make this last a little longer. Wishful thinking. "Yeah, okay, I do. Look, Seven, it's fine. Even if I whine and plead and beg you to consider my feelings, none of it matters, and I've accepted that that's just the way it's going to be. I'll still support you even if you don't want me to, that's _my_ choice, but as for your behavior, well, that's yours. You're an adult." A pause, gaze flickering to the drain and bottle in his hand. "Well, mostly..."

He mulls over her words for a while, capping the bottle and setting it on the counter, and they settle into quiet for a few beats. She plucks her gloves off, tossing them in the sink and turning on the faucet to let the water run over. How did they end up like this? Things were so good, so good, before he came running and it all got shot to hell. She thought she was pretty charming, but she must be secreting something noxious that repels people she likes. The Seven that liked her a few days ago would probably like that theory, too. The opposite of an aphrodisiac. Like what stink bugs secrete to ward of predators.  _What Jumin would give to patent that for himself... We should get in touch._

"It does matter."

"Pardon?" she asks distractedly, fingers flicking the stream to test the temperature.

She feels a gentle weight from behind her. The bridge of his nose, his head buried in the crook of her neck. His hair tickles her nape. She stiffens.

"What's this about?" she asks warily, unmoving, eyes glued to the faucet.

"I'm saying that it does matter," comes his quiet voice. "How you feel. I'm not trying to invalidate it, I'm discouraging it. Just because I'm not able to love you back, doesn't mean I think it doesn't matter."

"What do you mean," she asks, voice rising, trembling, "what do you mean, 'not able'? Why? Like, because you're not letting yourself, or you can't because you think I look like some kind of bridge troll with the sex appeal of a wet napkin?"

Predictably, he ignores the bait. "Why I can't is entirely irrelevant. You and me, it's not going to happen, and that will not change." She can feel her heart splinter a little more. "But I want you to be happy, MC. It just can't be with me."

"Why not?" she demands, spinning around and shoving him off her - he lets out a surprised noise, clearly not expecting the impact - before grabbing his shirt and pulling him back, closer than ever, nose-to-nose. She can hear the sharp intake of his breath. "Why do you get to decide when and how and with whom I'm supposed to feel anything? That's _my_ choice, not _yours_!"

He grabs her hand bunched in his shirt, tight in his own, his voice biting and sharp. "Maybe not, but _I_ get to choose whether or not to accept you. And I can't! And you need to respect _my_ decision and find someone who can. You're wasting your time. The sooner you forget about me, the better it'll be for you. This is in your best interest!"

"Well fine!" she snaps, rolling her eyes exaggeratedly. "Reject me in my _best interest_ , then. Geez, that really helps me move on, Seven! Do you have Jumin's instructional guide on how to crush my feelings to a pulp to ease your conscience? Maybe you can throw together a hot dating app to get things going. Can you set me up with one of those Forever Alone Club members at the party? How about it? If I get all wet and wild, will that absolve you of whatever responsibility you think you have about me?"

His eyes darken, a low growl pitching in his throat. He's getting angry now, and she knows she has _definitely_ crossed a line, but she's angry, too. She's been stuck with his barbs and thorns in her all weekend, talked down at every interval with one-sided judgments and cryptic warnings and it's not fair, it's not fair, it's _her_ heart, it's _her_ life. She tugs her own mask down with a scowl.

"You want me to be happy? Really, truly? Then stop tossing me out like a tray of cat litter. Feelings don't work like that! You can't pretend they're not there, and you can't make me forget you, so why don't you deal with _that_?"

" _What do you want me to do_?" he hisses. "Tell you what you want to hear so you can live in a fantasy before I abandon you? You don't find that _wildly irresponsible_?"

"Honestly, Seven, do you think I'd be happier hating my best friend in the RFA?"

"I'm trying to _protect_ you!"

" _I don't need you to protect me!"_ she says raggedly. "Just let me fucking love you until you leave! Is that so _hard?_ "

He's frozen. She swallows the lump in her throat.

"Just... Just let me care about you, until you disappear into the ether. If... If you leave, I can't stop you, and I'll support you, whatever you choose to do, so stop treating me like... Like I'm some kind of _burden_  because I..."

She _had_ started off impassioned and fiery, but her voice had broken mid-way, dwindling to something weak and shaking. Her eyes sting, and she rubs at them furiously. God. She hates herself for not holding her ground. She buries her face in her still-damp hands, stubbornly, because if he can't see it, she can pretend she's not such an emotional lightweight.

It doesn't work. "Oh, god. Are you crying? No, no, MC, don't cry." She hears the squeak of rubber as he pulls off his gloves too, tosses them into the sink with a splash. His hands hover over her shoulders, uncertain if it should be touching her at all. "Fucking Christ, please don't cry, okay?"

"Th-that's... B-blasphemous," comes her muffled voice from behind her hands. "Th-thought you were the r-religious t-type." She hopes he laughs at that one. Anything to distract both of them from the fact that her dignity has bomb-dived to the pits.

Suddenly she feels herself drawn into him, pressed gently against the fabric of his shirt as he gathers her into his arms, firm and warm and as strong as the heartbeat she hears thumping in his chest. And she knows, she knows, that he's not wrong. Everything Seven does comes from a fundamentally good place. If she was remotely grateful towards him, she should listen to him and curse him, resent him,  _hate_ him, but she can't find an ounce of hatred in her for this selfish, selfless man, so he'll just have to deal with the disappointment.

He's rubbing circles gently, anxiously, over her back, as if it might soothe her hiccups. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. I just... I feel like this will make it easier in the long-run. This is how it's gotta be. Don't cry, please."

"How do you know I'm crying," she challenges weakly, face still hidden. "P-prove it."

" _Meanwhile, most toddlers and monkeys in zoos have mastered the skill of object permanence, secondary to flinging their own poo_ ," he narrates, his voice deep, chest rumbling. " _News reports suggest that Seven Zero Seven mastered it at the tender age of twenty-one. Nature is amazing._ "

"Stop being funny when I'm mad at you," she groans, letting her hands drop to her side, though her face is still tucked into his collar, buried against his neck.

"Sorry." Quiet and sincere.

They just stand like that for a few moments, held together, with nothing but the sound of their breathing and the dripping of the faucet. She closes her eyes, counts down, _5-4-3-2-1, breathe_ , then finally lifts her head and presses back to look up at him.

He's watching her, concerned, studying her face, as if trying to crack some kind of code, and the other hand reaches up to wipe the last few tears rolling down her cheeks, fingers warm and firm.

Suddenly she feels horribly self-conscious, largely about the fact that she just gave him a healthy coating of tears and snot, as ominously dark as the stain on his jeans. "Oh my _god_. Your shirt. Seven, I'm sorry."

"I'll toss it in with the next load," he says dismissively, drawing himself back and letting his hands slide down to hers, giving them a brief squeeze before shoving them in his pockets, taking a step back to put some distance. "Maybe we shouldn't bring this up again, okay? This conversation, there's no happy ending to it. Rehashing it is just going to upset you. And me."

"I guess," she admits. But she already misses it, the warmth, his fingers on her skin. Like she needed another reason to pine after this stupid boy. _Stupid boy and his stupid warm body and stupid strong arms and stupid voice in her ear and stupid nice smelling hair and-_

"Um, so." He clears his throat, snapping her out of her reverie, and shoots her an apologetic look. "We're out of tissues, which, um, you need right now. And also everything on your shopping list, so... I'll go pick stuff up."

"Oh." Right. He's the errand-runner now. "Okay..."

"I'm... I'm going to use this time to get my shit together. I suggest you do as well. We _both_ need to. I know that sounds bad, but neither of us can afford to be on anything but our best game right now."

"Yeah." She hates the sound of herself agreeing, but deep down, she does understand. She has to. "I'll try not to be such a basket-case, too."

"You're not," he says. "You're really not, I swear. This is all on me. Wish you'd resent me for it a little more."

"Tough luck," she mumbles.

He steadies both of them with another brief squeeze of her shoulder. "Don't open the door, don't move if you hear anything, and if you do then call me immediately, and if you can't reach me call Jumin, and-"

"-don't touch your computer while it's calculating at 5000 hacks per second, got it." She rubs her nose. "Be safe."

"I always am."

She watches him as he tugs the head cloth off, shaking out those wild red locks, and heads into the hallway. He snatches his wallet and phone and her shopping list from the counter, pats himself down a couple times, and reaches for the door. He pauses, glances back.

"I wouldn't worry about the whole 'looking like a troll' thing, by the way."

She blinks. "Huh?"

"You know I'm a troll too, MC. It's the best comparison you could have made."

He flashes her a ghost of a smile, then replaces it with his calm mask, and steps out of the apartment.

The door clicks shut, and then she's standing there by herself, laughing through the tears.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I like to see my kids in pain. It just hurts so good???? ;;
> 
> This ending leaves things relatively unchanged in their relationship to preserve the game's natural progression. I really just couldn't imagine there not being any real confrontation throughout the course of Seven's stay. I always got the sense that MC was a really sassy and headstrong character, so I was super frustrated when the only options were to be either nice or possessive. 
> 
> That's not to say that being those things reduces her strength as a character! On the contrary, I think it takes a tremendous amount of strength to be so controlled when someone you love hurts you. But I think there's also a way to be angry and critical of someone you care about. Sometimes you have to stand up to people you love! 
> 
> ...That's how I felt, anyway. =v=; Hahahahahahaha I just assume everyone else yelled "JUST LET ME LOVE YOU" at their phones, too.
> 
> I also hope people can empathize with the trials and tribulations of battling hair monsters on a deep, emotional level. 


End file.
